Meretz and Ra’am slip under threshold with 34% of votes counted

The vote count is progressing at the Central Elections Committee, with 34.3 percent of the total ballots cast now tallied.

The ongoing count is not representative of the overall vote since ballots come in from different areas of the country at different times, and the percentages allotted to each party will likely shift as the tally continues.

The left-wing Meretz party is currently under the 3.25 percent vote minimum needed to win Knesset representation with 2.67%, although some pollsters have predicted the party will pass and win around 4-5 seats in the final tally.

A Channel 12 pollster says Meretz is perilously close to the threshold and may slip below it.

The Islamist Ra’am party, projected to win 4 seats in exit polls, is also under the electoral threshold at 3.09%, according to the current count.

According to exit polls, the opposition Arab party Balad is not projected to win any seats. The current vote count sees them at 3.14%, hovering just beneath the electoral threshold.

Based on the current vote count, Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-religious bloc would pick up 72 seats, though this number will change as more ballots are processed.

Exit polls have predicted 62 seats for Netanyahu’s bloc, enough to secure a majority and form a coalition in the 120-seat Knesset.

The committee has so far counted 1,672,421 votes.